The Beetle: Large Print (The\penguin English Library)

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Synopsis: 'No room!-Full up!'He banged the door in my face. That was the final blow. To have tramped about all day looking for work; to have begged even for a job which would give me money enough to buy a little food; and to have tramped and to have begged in vain,-that was bad. But, sick at heart, depressed in mind and in body, exhausted by hunger and fatigue, to have been compelled to pocket any little pride I might have left, and solicit, as the penniless, homeless tramp which indeed I was, a night's lodging in the casual ward,- and to solicit it in vain!-that was worse. Much worse. About as bad as bad could be. I stared, stupidly, at the door which had just been banged in my face. I could scarcely believe that the thing was possible. I had hardly expected to figure as a tramp; but, supposing it conceivable that I could become a tramp, that I should be refused admission to that abode of all ignominy, the tramp's ward, was to have attained a depth of misery of which never even in nightmares I had dreamed. As I stood wondering what I should do, a man slouched towards me out of the shadow of the wall. 'Won't 'e let yer in?''He says it's full. ''Says it's full, does 'e? That's the lay at Fulham,-they always says it's full. They wants to keep the number down. 'I looked at the man askance. His head hung forward; his hands were in his trouser pockets; his clothes were rags; his tone was husky.